Habib Subah relishing big stage return at the Saudi Arabia Snooker Masters

A total of 17 amateur wildcards from across the region have been invited to the historic tournament, including seven from the host nation.

The most experienced and successful of these invitees is Bahrain's Habib Subah, who has been one of the best and most consistent snooker players from the Middle East area for over two decades.

The 41-year-old from Manama is highly decorated with national, regional and international honours, and briefly spent time on the professional circuit in the mid 2000s.

Subah's breakthrough on the global amateur circuit arrived in 2004 when he reached the semi-finals of the prestigious World Amateur Championship in the Netherlands; an event won by future world professional number one, Mark Allen.

Since then, Subah has regularly won accolades on the amateur scene. He is a six-time gold medallist at the Arab Championship, a five-time gold medallist at the West Asian Championship, and a five-time gold medallist at the Gulf Championship.

In total, Subah has collected more than 80 medals on the international circuit, including a world title victory last year in Doha when he won the IBSF World Masters Championship, defeating Mohamed Shehab - who is now on the professional World Snooker Tour - 5-4 in the final. During his stay in Qatar, he also won the team competition for his country.

Runner-up at the 2022 IBSF World 6 Reds Championship, Subah has twice made a maximum 147 break in competition; his most recent came at the 2022 West Asian Championship.

Snooker ranking event action back in the Middle East

Subah is the only wildcard at the 2024 Saudi Arabia Snooker Masters who played in the last professional ranking event in the Middle East - the one and only staging of the Bahrain Championship that was held in 2008.

Following a 16-year absence of top tier ranking action, Subah is thrilled that premier snooker is back in the Middle East and that he will be a part of it. "I'm very happy to be invited to the Saudi Arabia Masters and I'm looking forward to play good and do well.

"I know it's not easy, but nothing is easy - no match is easy on the pro tour. I'm very excited because I was a pro player so I know what it means to play in such a tournament."

With a reported ten-year contract signed to stage the Saudi Arabia Snooker Masters, there is a vision from organisers and local officials to increase participation and raise cuesport standards in the country. Subah believes having a major professional event in the Middle East will benefit the area as a whole:

"The tournament is a very big event in our region. 100% it will encourage more countries to host similar to this event. It will encourage more players to take the cuesports seriously and will encourage more sponsors. It is similar to the Dubai Classic in the late 80s and early 90s, and similar to the 2008 Bahrain Championship; I saw what that tournament did to our snooker federation and the players."

The Middle East’s snooker popularity and participation; Subah’s hopes of a professional tour return

Whilst professional events have been sporadic in the Middle East, snooker has a significant heritage in the region, with a plethora of established and well-organised events for its players; dispelling any myth that the sport is not popular there.

Subah explained: "We have a lot of snooker activities since a long time. For the amateur tournaments we have every year the Arab Championship, West Asian Championship and Gulf Championship. The region hosted many Asian Championships and IBSF World Championships, and we have a lot of excellent players - great players, especially the last five, seven years, but unfortunately we had few chances to show them to the world, but now, hopefully, we are going on the right direction.

"Now more chances to play on the pro tour, the standard is increasing; more players, more young players on the scene, so hopefully, in the next five years you will see more players from the region on the tour."

Subah's time on the professional snooker tour was short-lived - one season in 2005/06 - but he was very unfortunate it came at a time when the sport was really struggling to fill its calendar, and was a few years before the Barry Hearn and Matchroom administration completely revitalised the top tier game.

However, with more lucrative opportunities now open in his region and beyond, Subah is aiming for a return to the pro tour. The creation last season of a Q Tour Middle East series - by the sport's governing body the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association (WPBSA) - provides a direct pathway to the Global Q Tour Playoffs where there are multiple professional tour cards on offer. Last season, both Iran's Amir Sarkhosh and the United Arab Emirates' Mohamed Shebab both earned promotion to the World Snooker Tour via this route.

Winner of this season's opening Q Tour Middle East event on home soil, Subah currently leads the regional rankings, with the top two at the end of the series qualifying for the playoffs.

"I was a pro player in the 05/06 season, but at that time snooker, to be honest, wasn't in a good shape. There were only six, seven tournaments and you play just one year and that's it, but now you're guaranteed to play at least two years with more than 20 tournaments, so more chances to get used of the atmosphere and everything.

“I am trying to get back to the tour again. To be honest, for the last 10 years I didn't try, but from last year I decided to try to get back on the tour again and let's see; let's see what happens.”

Time for a major snooker event outside of the United Kingdom

Despite the infancy of the Saudi Arabia Snooker Masters, the new competition has already been branded as snooker's 'fourth major' - reflected by the huge prize money on offer - alongside the long-established UK Championship, Masters and World Championship events, which in the modern era of the sport have always been held in the United Kingdom.

For the global progression and prosperity of the sport, Subah feels that having such a massive professional tournament away from the UK is a big, positive step for snooker.

"We need the game to be everywhere. We need more tournaments like this in every part of our world. If we want to increase the level of everything in this game, we need to organise such a tournament- even if we organise with less money. But we need to work together; I mean the pro world with the amateur world, because if we need our game to be in the Olympics, we need to cooperate together.”

Subah's first round match on Friday is against 20-year-old professional rookie from Poland, Antoni Kowalski. In preparation, Subah has been practicing with Jimmy White in Bahrain, who is a frequent visitor to the country. Of the 62-year-old legend, Subah said "He is still playing awesome. We had good sessions together."